Gary Oak (Japanese: オーキド・シゲルShigeru Okido) was the childhood friend and primary rival of Ash Ketchum, prior to their final battle in the Johto League, and grandson of Professor Oak. His Japanese name is derived from Shigeru Miyamoto.

History

Gary has been a neighbor of Ash Ketchum since they were both young. At one time they seemed to be friends and went to see movies together as seen in Lights, Camerupt, Action!. Before either of their journeys began, both Gary and Ash found an old Poké Ball while fishing. The two boys began fighting over who would get to keep the Poké Ball but ended up breaking it in half, ending their friendship. Since then, they decided to keep the two separate pieces for themselves. It was revealed in The Ties That Bind that they still carried the pieces with them.

As Ash kept in touch with Professor Oak, he has informed Ash about Gary being ahead of him with the amount of Pokémon he caught and Badges he received.

In Dig Those Diglett!, Gary was one of the Trainers who decided to help out the foreman in getting rid of the Diglett. Gary attempted to send out a Pokémon but the Pokémon did not exit the Poké Ball, thus having the Diglett return it to him. As he tried other Pokémon, they did not come out of their Poké Balls too and the Diglett returned them to him. Since his Pokémon did not want to battle the Diglett, he deemed it pointless to stay and left with his cheerleaders in the convertible.

Prior to the events of The Battle of the Badge, he had received ten Badges. He went to the Viridian Gym and took on the Gym Leader, Giovanni. At first he seemed to be winning against Giovanni, knocking out his Golem and Kingler with Nidoking and Arcanine, respectively. But then Giovanni sent out Mewtwo against the Trainer and even let Gary use both his Pokémon against him. Mewtwo made quick work of the two Pokémon and Gary ended up losing.

Gary in the original series

When Ash and his friends went inside the Gym, they found Gary lying down, suffering from the defeat of Giovanni and Mewtwo. Gary explained to Ash about the Mewtwo that is evil even though Ash denied the fact. Afterwards, Gary watched Ash's battle with Team Rocket. Following the battle, the Gym started to collapse and Gary and the others were able to flee the building.

In Showdown at the Po-ké Corral, Gary returned to Pallet Town and headed to the lobby of Professor Oak's Laboratory. Professor Oak mentioned to both Ash and Gary that they were the top Trainers in contrast to the other two who left the same time as them as they couldn't compare with their battling skills. Professor Oak showed Ash Gary's collection of Pokémon. After Team Rocket was defeated, he promised Ash that they would have their battle at the Pokémon League.

In All Fired Up!, Gary met up with Ash in the Pokémon League in Indigo Plateau. He departed the area after claiming he would get Loseritis. The next day, he was seen in the stadium with the other Trainers and Ash. He did not stay that long as his opponent, Melissa, defeated Gary's Nidoking using her Golem, which eliminated him from the Pokémon League. Following the loss, he left on another journey.

Gary eventually returned from that journey in A Tent Situation. Much unlike his former self, he congratulated Ash on his victory in the Orange League. Ash challenged him to a battle in the next episode with his Pikachu as his choice. Gary in turn used his Eevee. Gary managed to defeat Ash and then left on his journey through Johto.

In Power Play, he battled a Trainer named Alex Davis with his Umbreon. Gary was able to defeat Alex and his Alakazam. The battle made Ash want to challenge Gary next, but Gary refused and walked off. Ash sent out his other Pokémon to battle Gary's Umbreon instead of Pikachu but he already left. At the campsite, Gary and Umbreon noticed a blackout in a town Ash and his friends were in. Gary and Umbreon jumped into the rescue of the Power Plant when the Robo-Mecha Wobbuffet was attacking it. Following the mecha's defeat, Gary worked with Ash and his friends to get the power back on.

In Extreme Pokémon!, he was practicing with Arcanine for the Extreme Pokémon Race. He then entered the race and competed against Ash and his Bayleef. They were both in the lead but Ash was able to narrowly win the race.

Gary arrived in Silver Town in A Claim to Flame! to compete in the Pokémon League. He greeted Ash and exchanged pleasantries, promising to get to the top and defeat Ash. Gary was able to get past the screening round along with Ash and Harrison.

During his time in Sinnoh, Gary became an assistant of Professor Rowan. As before, Gary conducts his research on rare Pokémon, including Fossil Pokémon and Legendary Pokémon. Gary demonstrated more maturity and more respect for other people, principally with Ash. Upon meeting him, Dawn thought that he was a poet like his grandfather.

In Ill-Will Hunting! he was taking care of a group of Shieldon and protected them from the evil Pokémon HunterJ and her minions, Gary and Ash were forced to join forces to defeat the enemy, even though Ash has been against it. However, thanks to the efforts of the two they managed to save Shieldon from the hands of J.

Character

Gary and Ash

The day he started out on his Pokémon journey, he came off as an arrogant Trainer, much like his game counterpart, Blue. His chosen starter Pokémon was Squirtle, which was actually the same Pokémon that Ash originally wanted to start with. He even had a group of cheerleaders who cheered him on in all his battles and would go so far as crying whenever he lost. He didn't walk on his journeys like most Trainers did; instead he had his own sporty red convertible with a chauffeur. Gary loved when he got a chance to make fun of Ash by bragging about how far behind Ash was compared to him. He also gave Ash the pet-name of "Ashy-boy" (Japanese: "Satoshi-kun"), which occasionally seems to annoy him. His style of training at this point was to capture many Pokémon and to use the strongest, as a stark contrast to Ash, who focused on developing a bond with his Pokémon.

His arrogance continued overtime during Ash’s journey in Kanto until he challenged the Viridian CityGym Leader, Giovanni, to a Pokémon battle for his final (but not necessary) Badge in The Battle of the Badge where his was brutally defeated by Mewtwo. However, this still didn't change his arrogance. It would take a loss at the Pokémon League way later on against Melissa for him to finally realize that he greatly needed to change himself.

In his few appearances during the Johto season, he seemed to have become the complete opposite of who he was. He became polite and respectful to others, including Ash.

Pokémon

Since the very start of his own journey, Gary has shown exceptional skill as a Pokémon Trainer, catching and training an astonishing number and variety of strong Pokémon in a short period of time and losing battles very infrequently. However, since retiring as a Pokémon Trainer to become a researcher, it isn't known if he continues to catch new Pokémon often.

On hand

In storage

Giant Krabby

Gary's Krabby was seen for the first time in Mystery at the Lighthouse after Ash had captured his own Krabby and he called for Prof. Oak to see that it was okay as it had been teleported to his laboratory right after the capture. Oak then also showed Ash Gary's Krabby, which was way bigger than Ash's.

Gary's Nidoqueen was seen for the first time in A Tent Situation, where Gary used her to defeat Team Rocket, who were attacking Professor Oak's Laboratory. She was seen again in the Silver Conference, where she easily defeated Ash's Tauros, but was taken out by his Snorlax's Ice Punch.

Gary used his Magmar during his Silver Conference battle against Ash, sending it to battle against Ash's Heracross. It managed to engulf the Single Horn Pokémon in flames from Fire Blast and a point blank Flamethrower, but Heracross proved to be extremely tough as it beat the flames away and managed to beat the Spitfire Pokémon with its powerful Megahorn.

Gary used his Scizor during his Silver Conference battle against Ash. Its speed was far too much for Ash's powerful Snorlax, delivering multiple Quick Attacks in fast succession, avoiding a Hyper Beam and then striking it in the face with Metal Claw. It also solved the problem Gary's Blastoise was having with Muk, knocking it out with a Swift attack. Ash's final Pokémon, Charizard, managed to stop Scizor in its tracks by blasting it in the face with Flamethrower.

During his battle against Ash in the Silver Conference, Gary used his Golem to battle against Ash's Charizard. Despite stunning Charizard with Magnitude and being too heavy for Charizard's Seismic Toss, the Megaton Pokémon was knocked out by Charizard's Dragon Rage.

Before his battle against Gary in The Ties That Bind, Ash was seen checking Gary's page on the Silver Conference website, where Gary's Pokémon were listed with pictures. Among them, there were several Pokémon that Gary hasn't been seen using. The listed but yet unseen Pokémon were Alakazam, Houndoom, Pinsir, Fearow, Kingdra and Skarmory.

In the Ash and Pikachu manga

Pokémon

In The Electric Tale of Pikachu manga

Gary Oak in The Electric Tale of Pikachu

Gary is one of the recurring characters in the The Electric Tale of Pikachumanga. In the manga, Gary is a childhood friend and rival of Ash and frequently appears when Ash does something wrong. He has a sister named May, who has no equivalent in the anime.

At the Pokémon League, he is defeated by Ritchie, but confronts Ash at the end of the series. In the epilogue, he and Ash are shown traveling together on their journey.

Gary sent out Gyarados along with his other Pokémon to battle the giant Slowpoke after Arcanine became hypnotized by it. However, it wasn't long before it fell victim to the giant Pokémon. Later, Gary sends it out as a way of traveling on water so he can catch it after Team Rocket came by and tried to steal it with their net.

Ash and his rival, Gary, both battled for this giantSlowpoke. Even though Ash was able to catch it, he gave it to Gary instead so he could get a picture of his sister, May. After this, they found out that Slowpoke had evolved into a Slowbro.

Trivia

Gary is one of the few characters from the original series who appeared during both dubs of the anime to have his English dub voice remain unchanged, always being voiced by Jimmy Zoppi who was credited as Billy Beach during Gary's appearances after 4Kids Entertainment stopped dubbing the anime.